So three days after the event and my knee is killing me, my back still painful and I can’t lift my left arm higher than my chest without it hurting. Would I do this race again? DEFINITELY!

No Fuss have taken mountain biking back to the mountains with this event. You’re out in the sticks, no easy escape route, no shelter and no hardpack smooth trails to roll along. Every mile of this race was hard work but everyone I spoke to was enjoying themselves and had a grin on their face.

My legs blew up about half way round so I was suprised to be told I’d finished 20th with a time of 5 hours dead. Ruari Watt was the fastest man of the day finishing in 4 hours 3mins just ahead of James Shirley and Neil Scott, while Hannah Barnes was the first lady home after just 5 hours 4mins.

Pete ‘Weeman’ ‘Christ on a bike’ Scullion was there with me for the race. Here’s his take on his longest ever off road effort on a mountain bike…

I am burst.

First tarmac climb was shite, and I was one of the folk going backwards through the ranks.

Managed to do a crap wheelie to over-the-bars for the MTBCut lens on the first fire track, then spent the next several hours not paying attention to where I was and just keeping the legs moving. The fast, open descents on the double track were amazing and got many a swap on hitting loose rocks at 30mph+.

The descent into KLL was GNAR and was gutted to flat 30 seconds in having overtaken a heap of mincers, got the red mist and almost died trying to pinball my way down the remainder. Got to the first AIDS station to find all the water and food had been consumed, so tucked into my copious supplies.

Went through about six or seven puddles up by the top loch which were so deep, I almost came to a halt and had to select a climbing gear to winch myself out.

River crossing was GNAR. Some 6′ 4″ guy on the far bank was telling me to keep my bike above my head. “IT IS ABOVE MY F**KING HEAD” I replied. It’s not easy being a runt!

The timed push was lame, but had some sketch descending afterwards which was sweet and was the point at which I decided to set up my fork and shock properly.

Got mad cramp and did the cramp shuffle, where you try and wiggle your leg in between the points on cramp in your thigh/calf.

Stoked to get in under 7 hours as it was the target I set from the off. 6 hours 56 made me happy.

Also managed to set my fastest ever run time down the World Cup track yesterday and capped off an epic weekend.

You can watch his over the bars antics in this sweet edit courtesy of MTBCut.tv. I know Stu, and the photographers, struggled to cover the whole course but this is a cracking video.

Big big thank you goes to the guys at Orange Bikes, firstly for getting a gear hanger sent out to me the day before the race, and secondly to Michael Bonney and John Chennells in particular for the photos you see here. The pair of them were dashing round all day trying to cover as much of the course as possible. Check out the rest of their sets on the Orange Bikes Facebook page.

The Tour de Ben Nevis went down this weekend…

As far as we can tell it was long, wet, windy and bloody hard work! WO team riders Steve Larking and Pete Scullion both survived the ordeal and are winging a repo over.

Here’s Orange bike’s Dave Flynn’s shaky video diary…

Tour de Ben Video Diary from David Flynn on Vimeo.

Wideopen team rider Wayne Appleby has had his full fleet of bikes nicked…

Scumbags broke into shed last night, cleaning out 3 mountainbikes and a pitbike. The cops are on the scene right now dusting for prints. Please – check out this post and let us know if you’ve got any info.

REWARDS if you can bring this stuff back kids.

Bike 1:

Brand new Solid M9 with 2010 Boxxers.  Conti Der Kaiser tyres, Superstar pedals (gold), Wideopen stickers on the carbon fork guards.

Bike 2:

2Stage Elite 9, Boxxer WC, Avid juicy 7, gravity bar and stem, SDG i beam saddle, Mavic 721 on reverse front wheel, brand new SLX cranks.

Bike 3:

2006 Specialized Enduro Pro – stock parts except for a set of new Conti tyres. No drive train.

Bike 4:

Demon X 125 pit bike – stock except for hi-rise Renthal bars.

All bikes were stolen from Flint in North Wales last night. They were all locked up securely using anchor points and top spec locks/chains. Whoever nicked ‘em wasn’t pissing about. If you’re in the area, keep your bikes safe and keep an eye out.

-update: More bikes were pinched in the same area from a different address last night… The police suspect both incidents were connected. Keep on your guard if you’re in the area!

The cops suspect a couple of scams are going around at the moment ….

1 – Scummers are targeting people that are selling high-end bikes or parts on ebay.  Keep your ebay stuff safe like this. When someone buys something off you, they can see your home address (like this). Be aware.

2 – Scummers are targeting people with posh bikes at trails centres and following them home to spot for easy thefts. Don’t go mad on this one, just be sensible and call the police if you spot anything suspicious at your local trails. Obviously NEVER leave your bike in the car and always lock your bikes up with a proper lock when you get home.  Proper means D-Locks not chains/loops.

Email me on Jamie@wideopenmag.co.uk … If you’ve got any info that brings these bikes back we’ll hook you up.

The Dudes of Hazzard episode 4 from Joe Barnes on Vimeo.

It’s Friday. Stop working and watch this video!

Charlie Watts is our young gun dirt jump talent – he riders for us at King of Dirt, Dirt Wars etc on a Rose Bruce.

Here’s a nice bike check vid on his whip to start the weekend.

Charlie Watts Bike Check >>

 Words. Steve Larking
Photo’s.Michael Bonney@ Orange Bikes.  

James Shirley. Pinning in, on his way to winning it.

Preparation, or at least lack of, defined the Wideopen experience at this years Endurance Downhill race. No Fuss Events put months of work into setting up an event like this. The sponsors and serious racers are thinking about the race weeks in advance. (Preparation fail #1) Pete and I picked up a van on Saturday morning, hurriedly threw bikes and kit in the back and drove to Fort William with about an hour to spare before the race. This is not very professional, neither would I recommend it to anyone wishing to be competitive at any sporting event.  

3-2-1 RUN!

An hour of bike fettling, feeding and setting up our wee pit area flew past and before we knew it everyone was heading to the far side of the car park to line up for the Le Mans style start. A 100m sprint to your bike was the first challenge of the day, followed by remembering where you actually left your bike and then you began the up hill slog to just below the wall ride on the track. This gives the field a chance to thin out a bit so there’s not a massive queue for the first gondola to the top. Some shady looking zip tie/ wooden stick lock out arrangements helped a couple of riders get up top a little quicker than others but for most it was ten uncomfortable minutes of hauling a heavy bike up a hill in a full face helmet and body armour.  

Upon reaching the top of the hill inside the top 10 I felt pretty pleased with myself, only to go over the first drop and… oh sh** ! (Preparation fail #2.) My forks blew and just sat at the bottom of their travel. This is what you get for trying to swap springs around in the car park 30 mins before the race start. It took me the best part of an hour to realise what I’d done to the forks but eventually I got them working again and hit the hill already three runs down on the race leaders.  

Iain 'Ace' Woodley - Hardtail Nation

 So sat on the gondola for my first run it suddenly dawns on me that I hadn’t yet ridden any of the new sections on track this year (fail #3). However a quick chat to the nice chap sharing my gondola and I have some idea of where I need to be on course. Turns out the nice chap is Guy Martin, who normally cheats by having an engine mounted on his bike, but I’ll forgive him for that as he very kindly let me tail him through all the new bits of track so I could work out where I was going.  

Guy Martin - Quick with or without engine

Right, one run down and who should I find in the pits having bike issues but Pete. After accusing him of just not wanting to race I promptly offered no help and headed back up the hill for another run. Big thanks has to go to Iain ‘Ace’ Woodley (Hardtail Nation) who, despite telling me he had almost no spares, managed to find Pete a working QR skewer and got him rolling again.  

Now I could try to tell you how my race went run by run but I honestly can’t remember. After 5 hours you sit on the gondola with someone and they start asking you how many runs you’ve done then quickly realise they’ve no idea what they’ve managed themselves. That’s not to say this race is not insanely enjoyable. As the day went on I started to enjoy the bike, the track and the banter on the lifts and actually starting to race people more.  

Naomi Williamson - Winner for the ladies

At the end of the day I managed to jump on the gondola with two minutes to go before the 6 hours was up, meaning I managed to sneak in one more run finishing on 11 in total, which ain’t bad for having lost an hour at the start. Pete joined me at the top for the final run, bagging himself his 10^th run and hitting his goal of double figures.  

The real hero of the day was local man Jesse Wigman. Now Jesse is no stranger to the track at the Nevis Range, however 13 runs and 4^th overall on a hardtail(!!!) is just ridiculous!  

Your title sponsors!

Your top three though were James Scott in third on 13 runs, Huw Oliver on 14 runs in second and James Shirley in first, also with 14 runs overall but just that little bit quicker than Huw.  

The real racing at this race though won’t be obvious on the results sheets. Loads of people I spoke to over the day were desperately trying to put a few runs into their mates or in the case of the Orange Bikes or Hope guys it was a battle for work place bragging rights.  

Steve Larking - In unfamiliar full-bounce teritory

Massive thanks must go to No Fuss Events for organising the show for the third year running now, and to Hope for backing the race once again and to Orange Bikes for their support in the pits. I’m sure the guys from Orange were very happy to see a huge turn out of Orange bikes at the race, if you were one of those riders (or if you just want to lust after the bikes) check out the Orange facebook page for all their photos from the weekend. All photo’s here and on the Orange page come to you thanks to Michael Bonney of Orange Bikes. 

Next up on the No Fuss calender is 10 More at Moray, followed by the Tour De Ben Nevis which will be the final installment of the Allround Mountianbiker series. As for me I’m off to the Selkirk MTB Marathon this weekend for 100km of trail riding round the Scottish Borders, fantastic!

Saturday saw the No Fuss Events team head to the 7 Stanes trails at Kirroughtree in Scotland for the second of their 10′s series. Wideopen rider Steve Larking was there to start his solo attack on the “Britains Best All Round Mountain Biker” challenge (more on that in a moment…).

MTBCuts Stu Thomson was also racing and put together this nice edit that I think somes up the event really well. Mud, rain, more mud but lots of fun!

So “Britains Best All Rounder Mountain Biker”. The idea is riders enter three of the toughest No Fuss races and are awarded points depending on their performance in each event. After the third race the rider with the most points is crowned Britains Best All Rounder.
10 @ Kirroughtree was the first event to test riders all out endurance seeing how many laps of the course they could do in 10 hours. The second race, the Endurance Downhill, is in two weeks time and will see riders tackle the World Cup Downhill track at the Nevis Range near Fort William in an attempt to get as many runs in as possible in the 6 hour time limit. Then in September everyone will make their way back to Fort William for the Tour De Ben Nevis which is set to be one of the UKs longest and hardest point to point stage races.

Steve got off to a good start at 10 @ Kirroughtree managing 6 laps before the event was stopped early due to fading light in the trees and the track rapidly getting more cut up on the natural sections. That put him 38rd out of 126 solo riders. He is now currently on the blag trying to convince someone that lending him a downhill bike to race Fort William on is a good idea!